Seton Hall raised a Big East championship banner on campus Friday night for the first time in 23 years, along with its first NCAA Tournament banner in a decade. Watching with the packed crowd was Isaiah Whitehead, wearing Nets gear as he is now playing in the NBA instead of starting his junior season in South Orange.

But even with Whitehead’s departure, Seton Hall showed there is still enough talent for another memorable campaign in a 91-70 season-opening win over Fairleigh Dickinson.

“A lot of people think we’re not good because Isaiah left, so we still have something to prove,” Carrington said. “Everybody knows what they have to do.”

Though Delgado — who left with an ankle injury in the first half, but returned minutes later — was active from the start, the Pirates looked shaky early, struggling on both ends of the floor.

Getting by on superior talent, Seton Hall built a 13-point lead, and was fortunate to be up 33-28 at halftime, following a slew of off-target open looks by the Knights, who missed 10 of their first 11 3-point attempts and shot 29 percent in the half.

“Everyone had to get their butterflies in the first half,” said the Pirates’ Desi Rodriguez, who finished with 12 points, 10 rebounds and five assists. “The chemistry will only get better every game. We just had to pick up where we left off.”

Seton Hall’s second half looked like this past March at Madison Square Garden, with the Pirates shooting nearly 79 percent from the field, and finishing with a 52-18 edge in points in the paint.

After Fairleigh Dickinson’s Darian Anderson (27 points) cut the lead to single-digits with a four-point play with 6:51 remaining, the Pirates emphatically demonstrated the difference between the Big East and Northeast conferences, buoyed by graduate transfer point guard Madison Jones, whose stellar debut included 10 assists and one turnover.

With Whitehead taking pictures and signing autographs for fans throughout the night, hypotheticals were unavoidable. Overhead, plenty of space remained for another unveiling to start next season.

“All these guys understand and respect what Isaiah did for them last year, they really do,” coach Kevin Willard said. “They just understand the responsibility. They have to step up their games … That’s what I like about this group. They understand it’s not like, ‘Hey, I have to do it myself now because Isaiah’s not here.’ It’s that we all gotta do it.”